To think that it's about time islamic fundamentalism is dissected and challenged

[diddlysquatagain]

Did anyone read the very interesting article by Matthew Syed (sorry if behind a paywall) - Sunday Times: 'One thing has been holding back the Middle East for centuries':
https://www.thetimes.com/comment/columnists/article/middle-east-religious-fanaticism-iran-kcvh5knn3

"The Middle East was once the centre of the intellectual world. Then it went into reverse. The problem then, as now, is Islamic fundamentalism. No peace or prosperity is possible until the madrassas and other machines of indoctrination are confronted"

The police know him rather a lot, he has been arrested more than once. The last time he was sent to a mental hospital for a few weeks. His poor wife actually managed to get out for shopping in the company of another Afghan couple. Fully veiled, though. He's been interviewed again, recently, for breaching the terms of his release. I believe the police are keeping it quiet ie out of court. I'd say no one gives a stuff about his wife. Probably too difficult and "sensitive"...

This doesn't happen in the UK. It might in America, but Christian fundamentalists dont really exist here. Or it is extremely rare. I have no issue with Islamic fundamentalism in Islamic countries. That's how it is there. Thats how their regimes translate their culture. But I do have an issue when it starts to be a problem in the UK because we've fought for equality for women for centuries and that's now being eroded because we're allowing people to settle here whose own values and morals dont align with our own.

You are extremely naïve. The exclusive brethren do all of this here in the UK. Including forced cousin marriages resulting in inbreeding health problems, locking people up (literally) enforced clothing rules, head coverings, abuse and alcoholism, financial control, separatism, control of devices, women may not work, ....

But nobody cares about that because they're white.

Source?

Apart from first hand from working with them and their children, the majority of whom are miserable and cut off from society, the vast amount of documentaries and literature available from people who have escaped the cult.

If you're actually interested there are some really good books by survivors

@Bigpinksweaterstart here www.theguardian.com/news/2025/jul/24/jesus-army-fellowship-cult-noel-stanton

This is a gross equivocation.

People don’t care because they are tiny in number and right at the margins of society. They don’t represent mainstream British culture at all… It is estimated they number around 18,000.

On the other hand, Islamic culture is pervasive and increasingly looking to flex its political muscle - see Muslim Impact Forum - with 4 million adherents (and I accept that not everyone who calls themselves Muslim is a part of that culture, but many are), 50% of whom are under 25.

Muslims tend to see themselves as Muslims first and British second… This is a recipe for sectarianism, and will be devastating for the UK if not addressed immediately.

Yes, of course there have been cults here that are British… these are tiny and unrepresentative! It’s not comparable at all! It’s a ridiculous response to those troubled by the rise of fundamentalist Islam in the UK.

Agree

The rise of Islamophobia is extremely troubling and should be dissected and challenged.

Media coverage of attacks on Muslims is minimal yet very much on the rise.

Ah so its all fine then

Threads like these fuel the hate

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyjlx2e4l8o.amp

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/oct/09/muslim-charity-worried-hate-crimes-rise

We can’t ignore our concerns due to Islamophobia. That’s what lead to Rotherham.

Weaponising Rotherham to fuel hatred is what leads to Islamophobia

My priority is the safety of our country. You may have your own priorities.

You ANBU op but unfortunately I think that horse has bolted now.

No of course it’s not all fine! It’s just very different… All cults are damaging. It’s just that Closed Brethren number 18,000 and Muslims number 4 million. It’s not remotely the same.

Also, if I burnt a Bible in front of Brethren outside their place of worship, nothing would happen to me. If I burnt to Koran outside a mosque, I probably be killed, or at least have to live in constant fear of my life.

It’s a far right tactic employed by Yaxley and his odious ilk.

Are you saying that all 4 million Muslims are fundamentalists? Because there are 27.5 million Christians, of which the brethren are a part..

I fear the rise of the far right and how the gullible followers of Yaxley and Farage could potentially lead to a government led by a fascistic self serving businessman who will destroy it far more than I fear Muslims.

Agree

That’s weird because Muslim countries are much more far right than any in the West.

No, of course not. The fact that you’re trying to pin me with false equivalences demonstrates the weakness of your argument!

If the Plymouth Brethren, supposedly at the far extreme end of Christianity in the UK (less than 0.1%) wouldn’t attack me for burning a Bible, then that says a lot about Christianity…

I’m not saying all Muslims would want me dead, but there are eight Islamic countries in the world where the punishment for doing so would be death or life imprisonment,
so an extreme response to this within Islamic culture is pretty widespread.

And as for the last person who dared to do this publicly in a western country… well,
he ended up murdered. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salwan_Momika

We Jews feel it every day, thank you very much. Sorry if the existential fight for our very lives bores you.

Actually, your example doesn’t support your claim about what “Islamic culture” would do here. No-one in the UK has ever been murdered for burning a book (at least, there is no credible record of that). If that had happened, it would be a huge, documented case.

By contrast, incidents of Qur’an burning, or desecration of Islamic texts, do happen in the UK, often tied to acts of Islamophobia. For example, a man was fined (later his conviction overturned) for burning a Qur’an outside the Turkish consulate in London. The Guardian. He was not murdered, you will be the first to agree I think.

Religious hate crime statistics in England & Wales show that Muslims are disproportionately targeted. In the year ending March 2024, there were 10,484 religious hate crimes, with 38 % of them targeting Muslims.

The Guardian+3GOV.UK+3UK Parliament+3

In the same period, only 7 % of religious hate crimes were recorded as targeting Christians. GOV.UK

Attacks on mosques and Islamic institutions are pretty widespread. A survey found that around 42 % of mosques or Islamic bodies had experienced a religiously motivated attack in the past three years. Al Jazeera

Yes, there is more Qur’an burning (or more frequent attacks on Muslims) here than attacks on Christians.
The UK’s legal framework does not allow murder or violence to enforce claims of blasphemy or insult, whatever the target; such acts would be prosecuted under general criminal law.
Using foreign examples (e.g. places where law or culture is very different) to assert what “Islamic culture” would do in the UK is misleading.

You say the person thinks your argument is “weak” ; that itself betrays a misunderstanding of the difference between fundamentalism (a radical belief system, often minority) and mainstream religion (the broader, mostly non-extremist practice by most adherents). Conflating the two is imprecise and unfair. Fundamentalists exist in many faiths; they do not define the whole religion or its majority.